


sunflower seeds

by baibao



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: M/M, Mark-centric, Pre-debut, reverse hanahaki
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-14
Updated: 2020-01-14
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:13:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22253944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/baibao/pseuds/baibao
Summary: Mark hates Donghyuck until he realises he doesn’t.(In which petals tell you you’re in love, and flowers tell you you’re loved in return.)
Relationships: Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/Mark Lee
Comments: 29
Kudos: 257





	sunflower seeds

**Author's Note:**

> the idea for this came from the fact that i despise hanahaki byou aus, but really love flowers. also angst isn't my thing. so, here we are. i wrote this in 2018 and it has been rotting in my drafts ever since. i thought there wasn't much more i wanted to it anymore and it was about time for me to put it up, bc i really do love this. i might edit it someday, idk.
> 
> a quick lesson on hanahaki byou or "flower vomiting disease": essentially, a fictional disease that occurs when one suffers from unrequited love. typically, the patient will have flowers growing from their lungs, up their throats, until they suffocate. largely, fandom agrees that when the patient spits out a whole flower, this is when they die. there are many interpretations, however. also, the only two cures are having the feelings be reciprocated, or having the flowers surgically removed, but that would also erase all other feelings for whoever it is the patient loves.
> 
> on reverse hanahaki: i thought of this years ago bc i hated the "love kills" etc, etc, trope and basically, when you're in love, your body produces petals related to your feelings/whomever you love. it doesn't hurt and most people treat this as a good thing, bc love is beauty and all that. (tho i was thinking that there may be complications for people allergic to specific flowers, but we won't be going there.) when your love is returned, you produce an entire flower, that lives for as long as your love lives. i would link the twitter thread i made, but i can't find it, so. lol.
> 
> note: we’re going to ignore the fact that sunflowers are inflorescences and that their true petals are microscopic and brown. @ botanists, i’m sorry.
> 
> hope you enjoy. <3

Mark is five and he knows a lot.

His parents tell him he’s very smart, and that’s a good thing, he knows, so he tells everyone that. _I’m Mark. I’m five and I’m very smart!_ When he does, the big people coo at him and agree with him, going yes, he is very smart.

His brother Jack says that he doesn’t need to parade around announcing that he’s smart, if he really was as smart as he likes to claim. But the word smart can mean a lot of things, Mark knows. It can mean the amount of gold stars he brings home from class at the end of the day; it can mean him being able to read his own bedtime story; it can mean correcting his brother’s pronunciation; it can mean knowing to wait for the light to turn red before crossing the road.

It can mean an infinite number of things, and Mark knows all those things, and that’s a lot.

He knows other stuff, too. He knows that the sky’s blue. He knows that chocolate is bitter. He knows that eomma’s favourite shirt is a soft pink one with ruffles along its end and it’s older than even Jack. He knows that when someone loves the way his eomma and his appa do, they grow flowers from the inside. He knows that the vibrant red roses on their altar are eomma’s and appa’s. He knows that they’ll live forever.

Mark is five, and he knows that he wants one for himself, too.

* * *

Mark is fifteen, and he knows a lot.

He knows that he misses Vancouver. He knows that SM Entertainment is the best entertainment agency in South Korea. He knows that it takes a thousand won to get to school through the metro. He knows that he can’t afford to fail. He knows that he hates maths. He knows that it’s tough to be a trainee, and even tougher to be an idol. He knows that he is an SM Rookie. He knows that he is the Mini Rookies’ de facto leader.

And he knows that he doesn’t like it.

Taeyong hyung is a leader, he thinks — a very good one, at that. Because Mark isn’t dumb, he’s _smart_ , he knows Taeyong’s done something before that follows him like a dark cloud even today. He’s been on the forums, and he’s seen the harsh criticism and the harassment that keyboard warriors throw at his hyung even when they know nothing about him or what he’s really like. But Taeyong stands strong, still, bending under the weight of their words, but never breaking. And when Mark goes to him after lessons end for some help, sees the exhaustion in every line of his handsome face, Taeyong always gives him his tentative, yet genuine, smile and makes sure Mark doesn’t leave the studio without what he came for.

Taeyong hyung is always nice, if a little quiet and stern, and always helpful.

Mark — Mark isn’t.

He is easily annoyed, easily anxious. When someone stumbles one too many times during practice, he tends to go stiff with nerves, jaw clenching around sharp words he shouldn’t say. Sometimes he trembles from it, the force of his feelings. The hyungs never push; they’re easier to be around, Mark thinks occasionally. They are easy to manage, playful and rough, but with enough years to them to stop before anything gets to become too much. Similarly, the dongsaengs know to tread lightly around Mark. But they’re young and so, so familiar with each other that boundaries have blurred and faded.

Mark knows that, too, so he tries his best. He grits his teeth and smiles thinly and swallows down angry words and even angrier sounds. He keeps his fists in his pockets and his kicks to the ground. He pulls up every ounce of understanding Lee Jeno and controlled Na Jaemin he has in his blood, and tries.

But his patience is a short fuse, and the big red button that unfailingly sets it aflame seems to be Donghyuck’s face.

He doesn’t mean to be as hard on Donghyuck as he is. He really, really doesn’t. He doesn’t like it either when Jeno gets that worried twist to his mouth, or when Jaemin is one inch closer to snapping, or when Jisung’s nose wrinkles like he’s about to cry.

There is just something about Lee Donghyuck that is unbelievably _impossible._ And it doesn’t help that Donghyuck never takes his shit. He always has to get the last word, always has to one up Mark.

And Mark? He’s exhausted of it.

Jeno, in true pacifist Jeno fashion, says it’s because they are too alike that they butt heads as much as they do, but even the suggestion of being similar to _Lee Donghyuck_ of all people leaves a sour taste in Mark’s mouth.

If he could, he’d work as far away from Donghyuck as humanly possible.

In reality, it isn’t as though he has a choice.

* * *

When the bell sounds, loud and shrill, Mark quickly gathers his things and heads for the entrance. He’s still struggling to zip his schoolbag shut when he meets up with Jeno and Jaemin up front. “Let’s go,” he says, glancing at his watch anxiously.

Jaemin leans back from where he’s had his face pushed close to Jeno’s. “Not yet. Hyuck’s still inside.”

And Mark nearly groans at that. “Of course, he is,” he grumbles.

Quietly, Jaemin scoffs at him, but turns away before Mark can egg him on.

It is Jeno who places a hand on his arm, fingers squeezing enough to keep him in place, but not to hurt. “Be more patient with him.”

Mark’s jaw clicks. “I already sent our schedule for today in the chat room this morning. You know how packed we are today.”

Jeno’s smiling understandingly. “I think manager hyung would understand when we tell him that it’s because Donghyuck was held back for a bit by a teacher. Don’t worry, hyung.”

That’s reasonable. Mark tells himself over and over again that it’s a reasonable cause for delay, and that their managers wouldn’t give them shit for it, and that Donghyuck isn’t trying to throw a wrench into Mark’s plans and give him more problems on purpose. But it doesn’t work.

He’s been so on edge in the past week, with monthly evaluations coming up and schedules as SM Rookies, that he’s nearly chewed this thumbnail to the quick and his aunt had to run to the corner shop for clear nail polish. He feels weird, seeing the glossy finish of his broken nails, but the gross flavour of the varnish reminds him not to hurt himself that way.

“God,” he says, when Donghyuck finally stumbles out of the front gates, cheeks flushed and hair clinging to his forehead with sweat. “I don’t know how long we’ve been waiting here.” (He does. Eleven minutes and almost forty seconds. They’re behind schedule.)

“I’m sorry,” Donghyuck moans, pushing his wet hair away from his face. “Come on, let’s _go._ ”

Mark can’t help but glance down to his phone, before he shoves it deep into his pocket and leads the way.

“Where were you?” he hears Jaemin hissing softly behind him. He wouldn’t have caught it over the bustle of the streets and the smacking of their own shoes against the asphalt if Jaemin actually understood the concept of hissing. “Mark’s pissed.”

“I know,” Donghyuck grumbles, and the telltale jingle of the keychains on his bag rings as he shifts it from shoulder to shoulder, “but my advisor keeps trying to get me to shift to the vocals track.”

“What did coach say about it?” Jeno pipes up, softer than the other two.

Donghyuck huffs loudly, sneakers squeaking against the tiles when they descend into the subway. Their voices are beginning to echo, but Mark supposes they don’t notice. They’ve always been easily caught up in themselves; Taeyong says that’s why Mark’s around. Because he has to watch out for them when they can’t watch out for themselves. (Mark knows a lot of things, but not included in that very, very long list is what he feels about this.) “He says he’s going to fight her to keep me in the dance track.”

“And what do you want?” Jaemin asks. He says it like this: What do _you_ want?, and in the noise of the metro, he forgets to keep his voice down.

It takes a moment for Donghyuck to reply, long enough that Mark’s already beeped his way through to their line and they find a spot at the end of the queue to a regular carriage. “I don’t know,” he says, a little brokenly. “I couldn’t think about anything except everything we have to do today.”

“Oh, Hyuck…”

Resolute, Mark keeps his eyes trained on the back of the head of the person in front of him.

Lee Donghyuck makes him feel so _stupid._

* * *

The first thing their manager tells Mark when they arrive is that he should be more responsible. The other boys are quiet and apologetic, but Mark doesn’t care. Keeping his lips pursed and his eyes sorry, he bows deep and begs for them to be let off easy this time.

When their manager gives them the go, Mark nods and hikes his bags higher up his shoulder. He doesn’t wait for the rest of them before making his way to the studios.

He doesn’t stay to listen to Donghyuck’s soft-spoken apologies and doesn’t stay to watch the way he tries to swallow down his guilt.

It’s not an issue, not really. In fact, it’s a non-issue. Everyone knows Mark isn’t really in trouble, and neither are the other trainees. But that’s just it — they are only trainees. There is only so much they can do before something breaks and the company decides they aren’t worth it anymore.

So when it comes down to it, Donghyuck’s heart of gold or whatever doesn’t matter in the slightest. Mark has other things to worry about, like finding the time to call his mother back and the vocal lessons he’s already half an hour too late for.

* * *

He gets pulled out of vocal lessons for SM Rookies things, or so the staff member says. Obediently, Mark, along with Jeno and Jaemin and Jisung and Donghyuck, follows them into a spare meeting room where there are sheets of paper spread over the long table. They are instructed to fill the forms in charmingly, as they’re going onto the app.

Mark honestly relishes in the opportunity to settle into the stiff, hard plastic seat. His throat aches from running over harmonies for as long as they have, on top of rap lessons earlier in the afternoon. His fingers almost slip on the condensation of the water bottles available to them; the coolness is a relief to his throat.

Jeno occupies the chair next to him, already scribbling in the boxes. Mark does the same absently, not needing to think much with how basic the questions are. What is your name? When is your birthday? What is your favourite hobby? What is your favourite food? Who is your role model? What is your favourite colour?

Suddenly, he pauses, and the word tumbles out before he can stop it. “Blue?”

Jeno’s head lifts from his paper, eyes blinking owlishly. “Sorry?”

Pursing his lips, Mark admonishes himself. It really isn’t an issue, but curiosity makes him continue. “Since when was your favourite colour blue?”

Jeno blinks again, slowly, then peeks at his own penmanship. “Oh,” he says, simply, leaving Mark even more confused.

Jeno’s only ever liked one colour, and that’s black.

It really, really isn’t an issue, or even something to think about, because Mark himself goes through the rainbow every now and then. People are fickle, that way. But this — this feels like it _means_ something, and he just. He just doesn’t know. It’s such a weird day. There’s something like an itch crawling beneath his skin, but he has no idea how to scratch it.

“Hurry,” Jeno murmurs, then, finishing off a cute doodle. “We still have practice.”

Mark nods.

Across for them, Jaemin and Donghyuck are flanking Jisung, leaning into his space and giggling over his answers.

“That’s so cute,” Jaemin cooes, cheek in palm, paper flipped over and pushed away. The pen in his hand clicks against the varnished tabletop.

On the other side of Jisung, Donghyuck makes a high sound of agreement. Blithely, Mark wonders how Donghyuck can still go on and on, seemingly genuine and enthusiastic as he is.

But then again, he’s never known Donghyuck to be capable of keeping his mouth shut.

* * *

They’re going to guest on the variety show of one of the agency’s biggest idol groups ever and they’re going to perform.

The concept of it makes him sick with anticipation.

The theme is simple; they have to remake old SM songs, songs that paved the way for the industry they hope to break into in a few short years. It’s their opportunity, they say, to prove their worth to the company and to the small pool of fans they apparently already have.

It feels like he’s part of a survival show he never signed up for.

They only have this week to practice for next week’s episode. They’re going to be very busy. There will be dance sessions and new choreography to learn, vocal training and etiquette lessons, styling meetings and fittings and rehearsals and — more.

It’s a good opportunity, the staff member says, like he’s said about everything else they’ve had to do since signing their trainee status away to SM, taps his watch and then pats their heads. Mark watches him walk away, feeling exhaustion sink into his bones.

“C’mon,” Jeno murmurs, tugging on the end of Mark’s sleeve beseechingly. “Let’s have lunch.”

Inhale, one, two, exhale, one two.

“Okay,” he says, and follows the boys to the company dining hall.

Mark gets a sandwich and settles into their regular table quickly enough, Jeno knocking elbows with him. Mark’s trembling — with nerves, or hunger, or —

Mark is smart. He knows a lot of things, and he knows, with certainty, that guesting on a Very Big sunbaenim’s variety show is a Very Big opportunity. It makes his breath come quick and his heart shudder in his chest.

He is pulled out of his mind forcefully at the sound of loud, shrieking laughter.

“They’re insane,” Jeno comments underneath his breath delightedly, eyes curving into pretty crescents. “They’re actually insane.”

Mark parrots him, though with much more horror in his voice, “They’re _insane_.” His roast beef sandwich rapidly loses its flavour in his mouth at the dread of having to face their managers later. He can already imagine the lectures that would come. They are only trainees, after all. They are temporary in all senses of the word; expendable, even.

Any form of misconduct is a negative point in the eyes of the higher-ups, and their favour is something essential for debut.

But, of course, he muses sourly, Donghyuck doesn’t need to worry about the favour of the board members.

He watches them over his lunch, watches Jaemin and Donghyuck dance to the music pouring from the speakers, a lyricless, generic sort of tune that has them popping along to the beat. Their own meals go ignored for the most part, only half-eaten. Jisung meekly picks at the remainder of their food, leaving the vegetables he doesn’t like and going for the meat and bread.

Donghyuck, to Mark’s mortification, begins to sing. In the cafeteria, with its tall, uneven ceiling and awkwardly spaced wooden furnishings, the music-noise bounces around unpleasantly, but Mark still pays attention. It’s hard not to. It’s nonsense, really, what he’s singing, but it sounds unfairly good (beautiful, nothing Mark could ever do even if he tried) and Jeno laughs, raising a fist to cheer him on. Donghyuck catches his eye and winks, singing into the chopsticks he’s clutching in his hand like a lifeline.

Mark… knows that Donghyuck is charming. Objectively speaking, at the very least. He doesn’t understand the appeal himself, obviously, but he does see it, a bit, in his brightness and endless optimism. They have all joked, meaninglessly and without honesty (except, maybe only the teensiest bit), that they’d want to quit, when their limbs are dragging them down onto the squeaky clean floors and their throats are tired, tired, tired from practice. But Donghyuck never has.

When Donghyuck wraps a hand around Jaemin’s neck to pull him in close and croons into his cheek, Mark almost chokes on his sandwich. He’s absurd.

Then he begins to actually choke, reaching for his water bottle almost immediately. He can’t — he can’t afford to hurt his throat, he just —

And then he stops, eyes blowing wide at the bright spots of colour blooming along the edges of his plate.

Long, oval, and so, so _yellow_ —

In a panic, he shoves the petals into his mouth along with the last bit of his lunch. Sunflowers taste weird, he subconsciously notes, chewing almost furiously before swallowing it down.

When Jeno turns to him with a questioning look, Mark shakes his head and smiles. He hopes to God that there isn’t any yellow on his teeth.

* * *

When he gets home, he doesn’t bother to greet his aunt. He dumps his school bag by the sofa and makes a beeline for his bathroom, his gym bag bouncing on his hip. He locks the door behind him with an urgency that makes him wince.

It’s a mistake, he tells himself with shaking hands, it _has_ to be a mistake.

“Yeah,” he murmurs, a little hysterically, watching the clean porcelain surface of the sink. “Yeah, of course. That was just — just a glitch in the universe. Right? My own feelings won’t fuck me up as bad as falling for Lee Donghyuck, right?” 

He shuts his eyes and parts his lips over the sink. Nothing’s going to come out, he is certain, because he isn’t — he doesn’t have _feelings_ for anyone, much less Lee fucking Donghyuck with his annoying pranks and rude mouth.

But then he remembers earlier in the cafeteria, when Donghyuck, deep skin washed sickly by the unflattering lights and dark hair cropped horribly flat and close to his head, was so genuinely happy to be performing with his friend in front of an audience with the grand total of three people. And he feels it rise within him.

With dread, he opens his eyes to see his palms cupped instinctively beneath his chin, cradling a handful of long, bright yellow petals.

 _Oh_ , he thinks. _Oh, no._

The heavy thud his gym bag makes when it hits the floor is jarring.

But the sight before him is even more so.

* * *

The next time it happens is practice that weekend.

It’s a fluke, Mark manages to somehow convince himself between this moment and his breakdown in his aunt’s bathroom. It’s only a fluke.

He doesn’t look at Donghyuck once when their choreographer leaves them for another trainee group and tells them to polish the choreography until they can do it in their sleep. It is a bit harsh, or so Jaemin murmurs when the choreographer pinches the bridge of their nose in consternation before disappearing like they’re being _difficult_. But they all agree anyway — they need to be the best, and this is how they make it happen.

He doesn’t look at Donghyuck when he ushers them back into position, with Jisung at the vertex of their human V. His gaze sweeps over them impersonally as he stands by the sound system, prepared to start the music the second he thinks they’re ready. Usually Jeno would notice, something about the set of Mark’s shoulders or his feet, Mark doesn’t know, but Jeno always does. He is tense, and being tense isn’t optimal when one is trying to dance like they’re the best dancer in the building. (No one in this room is the best dancer in the building. Not even close. Not _yet._ ) But Jeno is preoccupied, running through the steps quietly with Donghyuck behind him.

Impatiently, Mark clears his throat. His foot would be thumping on the floor if he was the type to flex unnecessary muscles. “C’mon, let’s start. In five, four…”

The first run-through is a mess. They forget moves here and there, and bump into each other when they make transitions. They’re all young, all sharp elbows and thin skin and fragile ribs; Mark can feel the bruises forming along his side, collateral damage when trying to squeeze between Jaemin and Jisung to get to his fourth blocking and getting sandwiched. They’re nowhere near where they have to be.

They try not to let it bother them and scramble into their initial blocking as the music loops.

Seven runs later and it doesn’t hurt so much to look at themselves in the mirror anymore. The bruises on his skin can breathe.

“Okay,” Mark says, when he sees that they have all the pieces locked into place and all they need is some more (more, more, more) polishing and the clock tells him they have time, still, “five-minute water break, then let's start again.”

He receives slightly breathless affirmatives, all the boys forcing their limbs to wade through what feels like tar as they reach their stuff at the far end of the room.

Mark is content to flop down to the floor and chug his water back, suckling at the mouth of the bottle when it’s empty. It’s never a good idea to drink so much in the middle of a practice session, but he’s parched and he reasons that he can ignore that, for now.

Jeno is more refined when he drops down at his side, tucking his legs beneath him and taking controlled sips of his electrolyte drink. Jisung, sweaty and small and tired, leans into his other side, whining about the ache that’s began to settle in the small of his back.

Mark takes note of it, and reminds himself to inform someone in the staff about it. Jisung can do with a therapeutic massage soon.

Jaemin and Donghyuck, on the other hand, seem fine. They’re bouncing close to the mirrors with their overabundant energy, chattering miles a minute. Mark tries to parse their conversation, then understands it would take too much energy he just can’t spare.

So he watches them. They still have three minutes left anyway.

Jaemin is youngest in their group, second only to Jisung and it shows. He is small and slender, and Mark considers how strange it’ll be when he grows into his big hands and big feet and big smile. Jaemin has the makings of someone huge, in every aspect of themselves, and Mark can’t wait to see him then.

Donghyuck is taller in comparison. Not by much, but enough. He has to tilt his head a little to look Jaemin in the eye, but it’s hard for Mark to imagine he’ll be any bigger in the future. Donghyuck’s personality is larger than life, of course, but his fingers are slender and his shoulders are narrow. His legs are already a tad too long for his body, and his neck stretched. Mark can’t see him as anyone who he already isn’t.

Donghyuck is grinning now, trying to perform some complicated footwork Jaemin lifted off the internet. He stumbles a bit and Jaemin’s entire body moves to catch him before he can smack into the mirror, and the both of them screech with laughter.

Unbidden, the thought slips into Mark’s lizard brain: _Cute._

In a heartbeat, his mouth fills and he can’t breathe.

He’s running before he even realises it. His mind only turns quiet when the lock clicks into place. _Safe_ , it whispers, _you’re safe._

It still doesn’t feel safe, to him, not when he lurches over to the toilet and hurls, a fluttering of saliva-coated petals falling into the bowl.

The petals don’t even have the decency to sink into the water. They bob gently on its surface. A little hysterically, Mark thinks the sight of it would be beautiful, if he didn’t know where the petals came from and what they meant and where they were.

Donghyuck flashes through his mind again, his little giggle playing like the worst case of last song syndrome in the entire fucking world, and Mark pukes yellow all over again.

He has never hated a colour so much.

The banging at the door startles him, but he isn’t very surprised. The voice that filters through belongs to someone who will never leave him alone if they can help it, after all.

“Hyung!” Jeno is calling through the door. “Mark hyung! Are you alright?”

Groaning, Mark covers his face with an arm and slaps a palm against the wall. “Y-yeah.” His throat burns, as does his nasal cavity. It feels as though instead of petals, he vomited acid and his body is punishing him for it.

 _It’s not my fault_ , he thinks, sourly. _I didn’t mean for this to happen._

“Are you alright?” Jeno sounds calmer, less panicked, reassured that Mark hadn’t just face-planted into the toilet and drowned, probably.

Mark glares at the bowl and reaches over to flush them down. It’s comforting, watching the little things wash away. It’s like they’re disappearing, except Mark knows that the root of his problem is somewhere close to his heart and it only grows every day.

It’s like a cancer, he frowns. Except, he won’t die from it. Probably. He doesn’t know how this works, but he knows that people have died of broken hearts, before.

He’s not going to be one of them.

“I’m fine,” he slurs, exhausted. He rubs at his eyes with the base of his hands. “Just got a bit dizzy. Needed to let my lunch out.”

A pause. “Hyung…”

Mark almost laughs at the careful hesitance in Jeno’s tone, but he’s already busy rinsing his mouth and checking his teeth for spots of colour that shouldn’t be there. “I’m not doing anything to myself, Jeno. Don’t worry.”

Jeno huffs. “How can I not worry? You just… ran.”

“I’m sorry,” he says, sincerely. He stares hard at his own reflection; Mark’s always been a bit pale, a bit sallow. There’s no sickly pallor to him, now, even though he feels like he’s ill. The petals are a good thing, he remembers, to most people.

After he checks the bathroom over with a critical eye and a dose of healthy paranoia, he opens the door and steps out to meet with Jeno.

“Are you really okay?” Jeno asks, fiddling with the hem of his shirt.

Mark nods, patting his shoulder quickly. “Yeah. Like I said, don’t worry, alright?”

Jeno purses his lips, but nods eventually, and that’s good enough for Mark. Just before he moves back towards the practice room, though, Mark leans in and lowers his voice.

“You won’t tell anyone?” With trainees, the words _ill_ and _bother_ come hand in hand.

Jeno gives him a confused glance, already walking away. “What are you talking about, hyung? Let’s get some water from the vending machine already, you took so long.”

Grinning, Mark shakes his head. Actors.

* * *

It gets worse before it gets better.

( _It gets worse before it gets better_ , Taeyong tells him, once, when Mark catches him clutching at his braced waist after practice, _remember that._ )

It is a mantra that constantly runs through his head, at this point. One that he uses to calm himself down, and forces himself to take a second and think.

Ignoring the feelings he supposedly has, he comes to realise, is impossible. The petals always rise within him, unbidden, and he doesn’t know what it is about him, or even about _Donghyuck_ , that triggers it. At some point, it feels as though they are always there, floating in his ribcage and bobbing to the surface gently as the seconds pass. It is inconvenient.

He recognises soon thereafter that it’s similarly, if not more, impossible to get rid of the feelings. What can he do to manage that? Cut his chest open and pry the roots from his heart? Trick himself into thinking that he doesn’t believe that Lee Donghyuck isn’t one of the most magical people in existence?

In his horde of talents and odd tidbits of knowledge, playing mind games isn’t one of them.

The only solution available to him without having to confess to someone that this entire mess is even happening to him at all is to just live with it. It isn’t the best plan, he knows this bitterly, but he tries to make it work.

Mark learns to swallow the petals down, learns to develop a taste for sunflowers he isn’t sure he’s supposed to have. He learns to push the petals around with his tongue so he can smile and nod and answer someone and not have them notice the ball of yellow he’s tucked under his tongue or into his cheek. He learns to breathe only through his nose and to back away when anyone comes too close. He learns to be careful, more than he already was, more than he already has been, and it weighs on him.

He thinks his healthy paranoia teeters on the edge between questionably healthy and borderline obsessive when Taeyong throws him a weird look after Mark flinches so hard that he drops his water bottle just as he’s tapped on the shoulder.

It’s not a bad skill, he reasons with himself, after he’s just run away from Donghyuck who’d been looking for some one-on-one help with a rap segment and hoped that it didn’t seem like he actually was running away. They have a meeting in about fifteen minutes anyway; he doesn’t know why he bothered to not-run, but he did. He dabs at the sweat collecting on his brow with the back of his wrist, lips pressed tightly shut. He is only a trainee — it is prudent to be wary of anything that could ruin his career before it could even start. It is even more sagacious to carry the habit into if — when — he debuts.

Really, he barely convinces himself, it’s not a bad skill.

He is a pathetic liar.

At the very least, no one’s come up to him outright regarding his weirdness, and the staff don’t seem to have noticed anything. He counts it as a win.

As he considers giving himself a pat on the back, his body is jolted roughly. He almost stumbles, but he manages to grab at both the wall and his smarting shoulder at the same time. His heart is still skipping in his chest from seeing Donghyuck, and it nosedives sharply into a jackrabbit pace at the sudden shock to his system.

Jaemin walks past him without looking back, as though he hadn’t just shoved Mark nearly off his feet and onto his face.

He inhales deeply. “Jaemin,” he calls. Jaemin doesn’t stop.

Doggedly, Mark follows him. They’re heading to the same place anyway. “How were your lessons?” Mark asks genially.

Mark wants to feel surprised at the cold look Jaemin throws him, but finds that he can’t. The silent treatment is Jaemin’s default _you've wronged me horribly_ setting. Jaemin’s never had to keep his thoughts off his face; it’s a bad habit they will have to break, sooner rather than later. Mark doesn’t want to have to deal with it, even if he’s the most likely candidate for the task.

“Jaemin?” he tries again, irritation curling in his throat.

He sees the way Jaemin’s narrow shoulders jerk higher, almost up to his ears. It’s a defensive position. Mark wonders if he’s gearing up for a fight, decides that he probably is, and acquiescingly backs off.

Quietly, Mark trails after him until they reach the conference room. Jaemin doesn’t wait to see if he’s close before slipping through the open door and letting it fall shut behind him. Mark is quick to jam his forearm against the heavy door, and he enters the room with a dully aching shoulder and a stinging arm.

Impromptu meetings like this are hardly ever about good news. It’s usually to announce an end-of-the-month test or something similar. On principle, Mark tends to be wary about these things. But today — 

Today, the staff members who shepherd them around like lost lambs are obviously elated, clutching a thick booklet in their hands.

Mark eyes it, then the rest of his team who are visibly trying not to squirm in their seats, then the staff members themselves.

“Good evening,” he greets cordially, with a deep bow. When he straightens, he stares again. He can’t help it. “Why…?”

“Sit down, Mark,” one of the staff says, grinning widely, “we have news for you.”

The news is this: The producers for the variety show are so impressed with their recorded performances that they’re going to be doing extra promotion for it. If they show good results, they’re looking at a contract with their own variety show in the next year.

It is… a heavy pill to swallow. Mark is abruptly reminded of that one Spongebob episode with the fucking massive pill Mr. Krabs had to take because it was good for him or something, but it was really, really fucking big. This felt a bit like that.

Pressing the tips of two fingers together, he feels the whistle-stop throbbing of his heart in his thumb. He feels faintly like he’s going to pass out.

Of all of them, Donghyuck seems to be the most at ease with the situation. He’s beaming so brightly, he looks absolutely radiant.

Mark tries, and fails, to not stare at him until he can’t breathe.

He keeps his lips sealed tight until he’s almost choking on the fluff; it is barely half a minute after the staff dismisses them that he bolts out of the meeting room, down the corridor, and into the bathroom at the far end of the same wing.

The door swings shut behind him with a hiss, but he doesn’t pay it any mind. He stumbles into a cubicle and falls to his knees, catching the door with the arc of his back. He feels like he’s suffocating when he finally rips the mask from his face. He can barely even wheeze around the weight in his mouth before he coughs and coughs and coughs into the toilet bowl.

It is painful, more so than any other time he has done the same act. Is it because he’s been holding it in for hours? Hysterically, he remembers his mother holding him when he was only five as he hiccuped with shuddering breaths. He’d fallen down the stairs and hurt his wrist. He was swallowing his pitiful cries, because his brother always called him a baby when he cried and he wasn’t. He wasn’t a baby anymore. But it hurt, so much, and his mother had shushed him and told him it only hurts to keep his feelings in.

Mark doesn’t like this, doesn’t like how the rush of petals feels like shards of glass ripping up the soft membrane of insides, doesn’t like how the saliva that drips from his chin burns like acid on his skin. He doesn’t like the spring of tears to his eyes, doesn’t like the bone-deep shuddering of his shoulders, doesn’t like the sharp constricting of his lungs. He feels as though he’s run ten kilometers without break after being bed-ridden for a month — exhausted, painfully so.

Then he remembers Donghyuck, remembers the hand he’d placed on Mark’s elbow. Comfort, camaraderie. Another pouring of yellow. He’s trying to make everything better, but when it does, he only makes it worse.

The petals are going to make a mess at this rate, and Mark won’t be able to clean everything up and get back to lessons soon enough.

Mark despairs. Why does Lee Donghyuck have to do this to him?

He hears the door creak open, slow and tentative. Heart in throat, Mark pushes himself off his slumped position on the lip of the bowl and scrambles, clawing at stray petals that litter the tiles. He pushes them into the toilet, shaking his hand free of them. He’s trembling — no one can see, no one can _see._

He cleans himself up the best he can. Pulling his phone from his sweats, he surveys his face, rubbing at the tears tracks with the side of his thumb. There isn’t anything he can do about the redness of his eyes, but he can say it’s because he’s tired. The raw swelling of his lips and the flushing of his cheeks are easily concealed by his new, crisp mask. He pats around on the floor longer, ignoring the disgust crawling down his spine, as he makes sure there isn’t a spot of yellow left.

When he thinks he’s safe, he hears it.

“Mark hyung?”

He presses the back of one hand to his eyes. “Jeno?”

“Are you alright?”

Mark pushes his tongue to his cheek, and presses down on the flush. The water in the bowl swirls and drains away, the petals disappearing along with it. He exits the stall.

He tries to smile at Jeno with his eyes. “I’m fine.”

“That’s the third time this week,” Jeno says, voice quiet. “What’s going on?”

Mark waves him away. “It’s,” he swallows, “it’s nothing.”

“That doesn’t look like nothing to me.” And Jeno’s only turned fourteen, his eyes round and his cheeks rounder. He is soft, in all senses of the word, yet Mark cowers under his tough stare. “I don’t like liars, Mark Lee.”

So Mark peels the mask from his face carefully, untucking the garter behind the curve of each ear, and a handful of gently fluttering yellow petals fall to the ground. Jeno’s expression shifts in that rapid, sudden, unexpected way it tends to do, and Mark purses his lips. He can feel the rapid _thump thump thump_ of his blood against his throat.

“That,” Jeno says quietly after a long, stretched-out moment, “isn’t what I was expecting.”

“No shit,” Mark says under his breath.

“Who is it?” he asks, leaning down and taking one of the petals in his fingers.

Mark winces and kicks at him, “That’s gross!” He glosses over the question, and if he notices, Jeno is too kind to mention it.

“It’s not, really.”

“Don’t you think it’s weird?”

“Is it?”

“Isn’t it?”

Jeno shakes his head, “I don’t think so.”

“Why is that?”

Pushing down his collar with his knuckles, Jeno cups a hand around his mouth and closes his eyes. Mark is about to ask him what he’s doing when he realises it, feels the growth of nature’s softness in his mouth like a phantom pressure and the crest of it on his tongue. Jeno pulls his hand away with a bashful smile, and reveals his open palm to Mark. “Forget-me-nots.” Then, after a beat, “True love.”

The small, unassuming blue petals are nestled lovingly in his small hand, and Mark’s heart aches.

“You don’t have to tell me who it is,” Jeno says, jacket thick and warm and high collar zipped all the way up to his cheeks. Even when his mouth is covered, Mark can see his gentle smile in his eyes. “Sunflower, huh?” And Mark, inexplicably, blushes.

He knows what they mean, and he isn’t of any belief that Jeno doesn’t. Jeno has always just known stuff.

Adoration. Loyalty. The petals on the restroom floor feel like a lie.

* * *

It doesn’t make much of a difference, really, in the long run, but having Jeno know about the garden in his chest makes it feel a little less like it’s planting roots in his lungs and instead growing with him.

* * *

Mark doesn’t know what sets him off when it happens, really. Jeno’s been warning him for days that bottling it all can only spell bad things in the future for him, but Mark has always been good at everything he puts his mind to. Evidently, keeping calm around Lee Donghyuck isn’t one of those things.

“Just back off, okay?” he sneers, coldly. His heart thuds in his chest, painful and rapid like the galloping of a horse’s hooves. He’s panicking, every brain cell screaming at him _he’s too close he’s too close he’stooclose_ — then Donghyuck backs off, and it is with a sigh that every tight muscle in Mark’s body loosens just a touch.

Donghyuck’s expression shutters for a moment. It makes Mark’s breath catch – stupidly, because he was the one who made that happen, he was the one who _wanted_ that to happen — and his mind spin. The boy he — the boy who makes him choke on petals in his nightmares and in his daydreams is looking like Mark just told him he hated him and that isn’t what just happened.

“I’m.” Donghyuck pauses, then swallows. He hangs his head, dark hair falling neatly over his eyes. “Okay.”

Donghyuck’s voice is small. Mark wonders, faintly, when he ever heard Donghyuck use an actual _inside voice_ before.

 _Wait_ , Mark wants to call, _wait, that isn’t what I meant to say_ — except he can’t, because it is exactly what he meant to say. And it isn’t Donghyuck’s fault, but if he says that, then Donghyuck would want to know why, and he deserves to know why, and Mark would tell him anything he wants to hear. But Mark doesn’t know how to explain his prickly disposition without saying _it’s because of you._

So he doesn’t say anything. When Donghyuck bothers to look at him, he scrambles to keep his expression hard and his posture stiff. It isn’t too difficult of a task, Mark thinks musingly, because his guts are twisted so tightly that his muscles don’t have enough give to pull loose.

When Donghyuck is gone, Mark turns and walks down the hall in the opposite direction even if it means he has to take the emergency staircase to the floor below and then make his way to the elevators on the other side of the building just so he doesn’t see anyone who doesn’t want to see him.

He doesn’t need Jeno to hear someone say it to him. He already knows it. He fucked up.

* * *

Since It happened, Mark notices that Donghyuck has been walking on eggshells around him. The thing about eggshells, though, is that they’re frustratingly, pathetically easy to break. His one finger has more than enough strength in it to shatter a whole egg. For an overly energetic fourteen year-old like Donghyuck, or maybe especially Donghyuck, it is laughably effortless to do the same.

This is fine, Mark thinks, because he doesn’t know what to do if it isn’t.

 _Fine_ , he considers in retrospect, is such a miserable word. It is achingly insufficient, like butter spread too thin on bread. It is a blanket smelling of constant use and littered with moth-worn holes; when Mark drapes it over something he doesn’t want to see, it only calls his eyes to it.

“What is it?” Mark demands, after Jaemin slams Mark’s water bottle off the table for the fifth time in the last hour. His patience has been worn down so efficiently in the short span of their rehearsal period that it is now the width of a strand of hair. The weakest tug is going to make it snap.

Jaemin ignores Mark and chugs from his own, undented, water bottle. He has his back to him, but Mark can see in the mirrors his unpleasant expression and the stiff set to his shoulders.

His hackles rise.

Almost with a painful clarity, Mark knows what this is. He knows he fucked up. He _knows._ And he knows that Jaemin knows that he knows it, too. It is literally impossible to ignore the magnitude of just how much he’s managed to fuck up when he and Donghyuck are together for at least ten hours a day, the entire span of which Donghyuck becomes a champion at avoiding his eyes like one look from Mark will kill him.

And Mark feels the weight of it like a cramped muscle, heavy and tight and tender and numb, that some part of Donghyuck truly feels that it’s possible.

And Jaemin isn’t stupid. Reading people is child’s play to him, and it is an insult to him if someone was to assume that he hasn’t realised what’s been going on between Mark and Donghyuck the moment it started. And of course, Jaemin is also aware that it’s all Mark’s fucking fault.

And he knows that Jaemin is only worried, knows that Jaemin is only righteously upset on behalf of his friend and roommate. And that’s fine. That’s _understandable._ But if Jaemin tries something one more fucking time — 

In the mirror, Mark sees Jaemin look at him from the corner of his eye and sneer.

He surges forward.

Jaemin has to lower his bottle to avoid getting smacked with it.

They’re standing close, too close. Concerned, Jeno’s eyes move rapidly between them, sucking his bottom lip into his mouth and biting down. Mark knows that this is beginning to look ugly, but this is the only way he feels he can really find out what the _fuck_ is wrong with Na Jaemin.

“What the hell’s your damage, Na Jaemin?” Mark huffs, and even his own breath feels too warm for his face. After having lost his temper again, Mark let Jisung and Donghyuck excuse themselves for a snack break; he is peripherally grateful that they won’t be bearing witness to what is undoubtedly going to be a messy falling out.

Jaemin’s eyes flash and he’s shoving Mark back and away from him. He clenches his jaw. “You’re being so _unfair_ to Donghyuck, do you know that?”

“What are you talking about?” Mark knows the moment he’s offended Jaemin, and he doesn’t care.

Growling, Jaemin just tries to walk away from him. Mark is quick to latch onto his arm and drag him back roughly.

“No, Jaemin, don’t — I was _talking_ to you.”

“Fuck that,” Jaemin spits, wrenching his arm away. “Donghyuck’s been trying so hard to be careful around you and you’re still snapping at him like how you were when we were new trainees! I don’t know what you think about Donghyuck, okay? And I _don’t care._ But he doesn’t deserve that. _Any_ of that.”

Mark’s chest heaves.

“You’re so caught up in your own head that you don’t even realise that Donghyuck has never been mean to you. Not once. Not the way you are to him.” Jaemin’s face twists into a furious, anguished scowl, before smoothing into something more fragile. And then he goes.

Jeno’s eyes flicker between him and where Jaemin left through the door. Mark wants to cry for him to stay. _You’re my best friend._ But it’s unfair to Jeno, so he waves him off to chase after Jaemin before Jaemin can do something stupid, like ask Jaehyun to sneak them out to a paintball field and skip practice.

“Are you sure?” Jeno’s voice wavers, but his body is already turned towards the exit.

Mark sighs, nods. “Yeah. I’m sure.”

“M’kay.” Before he leaves, he says, “They don’t hate you, you know.”

He can’t find it in himself to reply. Jeno doesn’t like being told he’s wrong.

* * *

It is… a bad day.

Nothing is Donghyuck’s fault, but everything feels like it _is_ and Mark —

Well, Mark snaps. (Again.)

“I just can’t bear to look at you right now, okay?” he seethes, jaw clenched and eyes trained on the polished sliver of wood between their feet, because feels as though if he _looks_ at Donghyuck and sees the hurt there he will actually puke and nothing will come out yellow.

“Hyung?” Donghyuck says, and it’s quiet and pained, and — god, that fucking hurts.

“Just, fuck off.” It comes out in English, but Mark knows the message is received when Donghyuck jerks back and runs out the practice room.

* * *

The argument was short and explosive, and painfully one-sided, yet it left something festering in Mark’s chest.

It actually stings a bit, like the petals do, sometimes, when he can’t bear the thought of loving Donghyuck and treating him the way he does, to the point that it makes him feel sick. He thumps a fist over his ribs, thumps, thumps, thumps — but the bone-deep ache still hurts more than the bruise forming on his chest.

* * *

It takes him almost the entire day to hunt him down.

He has, on Jeno’s supposedly good word, Donghyuck’s favourite treat from the café down the corner from their school and a bottle of the sparkling water he knows Donghyuck likes on particularly exhausting days cushioned by his spare clothes in his gym bag. It isn’t much, he knows, but — he hopes it is enough. For a start, anyway.

Mark has made up his mind. He is fifteen, and he knows many things. The first of which being he has been extremely unfair, about everything, and he has been a complete jackass. There’s a more colourful description out there — and many more accurate ones, according to the endless stream of furious messages Jaemin has taken to sending him the moment before he goes to bed every night, but he feels as though the sentiment still carries.

Donghyuck watches him with a carefully guarded expression when Mark offers his meagre not-presents. He suddenly feels… achingly insufficient.

Maybe it’s only fair, when Mark probably makes him feel the same way.

It is impressive, that Donghyuck can relay his discontent with just the set of his eyebrows and his lips. Mark’s gaze dips to follow the curve of his shallow cupid’s bow, before flicking back up to his eyes. Did he notice that?

"What do you want, Mark Lee?" Donghyuck finally gives. _Mark Lee._ It is an invitation, a provocation, and a surrender, all at once. Startlingly, it sounds almost as though Donghyuck is giving up on him, on this. (Not them. There was never _them_ , just Lee Donghyuck and Mark Lee and all of his stupid fucking emotions that kept — keep — getting in the way.) _Mark Lee._ He isn’t trembling, he isn’t.

 _Mark Lee._ No one calls him by his full name, not even the company staff. He is too young for that, too green. There isn’t anything particularly outstanding in him that leaves people in awe at just the sound of his name. Not like Taeyong hyung and Jaehyun hyung who are always SM’s _Lee Taeyong_ and _Jung Jaehyun._

He’s just Mark. He’s always been just _Mark._ Especially to Donghyuck, it’s very rare that he is anything but Mark. Maybe it’s _hyung_ , sometimes, when Donghyuck gains a modicum of respect for him or when Mark glares him into submission. It is even rarer that he’s _Mark Lee_ , to him.

Mark can’t remember the last time he was _Mark Lee_ to anyone.

He doesn’t want to start, now.

“I,” his mouth is embarrassingly dry, “I just needed to talk. To you. If you’d hear me out.”

Donghyuck looks at him, then looks around them. They’re standing in the middle of the side corridor Mark managed to corner him in. Mark swallows and takes his silence as his cue.

“It’s not your fault,” Mark says, slowly, sincerely. He hopes that Donghyuck understands. “I’m an asshole who took a bad day out on you. I’m sorry.”

Frowning faintly, Donghyuck considers him. “You have bad days all the time?” Mark tries not to wince. He deserved that. Deserves more, probably.

“Anger is a secondary emotion,” Donghyuck suddenly says. “Did you know that?”

 _No_ , Mark admits to himself, bewildered and cowed. He doesn’t know that.

“Oh,” is what he says, very lamely, because he is a stubborn pig-headed asshole and even when he’s apologising, he still can’t swallow down his pride.

“Mmhm,” he hums, “so that’s why it’s fine if you’re always angry. There’s got to be a reason behind it. My halmeoni told me that it’s just something we can’t help.”

“Hey,” he protests, weakly, “I’m not angry all the time.”

Donghyuck gives him an unimpressed stare.

Mark’s lips pull tight. “Maybe just. Six out of seven days. On a good week.”

At that moment, the corner of Donghyuck’s lips quirk, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it quick; Mark only sees it because he can’t help but stare. His chest loosens. He hasn’t done enough yet, hasn’t said what he wanted to say, but — “That’s sort of sad. Hyung.” It’s not quite forgiveness, but it’s something.

Mark smiles.

* * *

Mark feels oddly like a bird who’s too fond of hoarding shiny things for itself whenever he drops in on Donghyuck and shoves a new pile of not-gifts into his chest. Or, maybe even better, a dog, whose owner’s just come home from a long day at work and deserves a slobbered-on, chewed-up ball at his feet because it’s finally time to play.

It’s not the social and emotional maturity he’s aiming for — pathetically far from it, in fact. But he sees the trepidation in Donghyuck’s form melt away bit by bit with every bottle of pocari sweat and every discounted sandwich from the company café, and he thinks that it’s still an apology.

Slow-going and feeble as it could be, it’s a start.

* * *

His nose itches. He rubs at it through the fabric of the mask, in hopes to soothe without actually having to take off the mask. A few feet in front of him, Donghyuck laughs, eyes squinting and head tipping back.

Mark coughs, and he feels petals slip from his lips.

At this rate, he thinks, he’d have to run to the bathroom and flush everything down the toilet. Again.

For now, he keeps them inside him, with him.

* * *

“Hyung!” Donghyuck squeals in his characteristically high-pitched voice, small fingers clasping around Mark’s elbow. His voice is cracking, now, but not so much so that it smothers his singing or embarrasses him. Mark doesn’t think he is even aware of when it happens, because he’s too caught up on the more important things to him — like the stories he’s sharing or the songs he sometimes cries along to. Mark doesn’t think it will be all that different when his voice settles, can’t imagine him sounding any less or more enchanting. He just is.

Donghyuck is growing, changing. He is everything Mark fears — something so beautiful and larger-than-life, something that has him caught in its orbit and has no plans of ever letting him go. Mark is honoured, in some visceral way, to change with him. He wonders if Donghyuck realises what he’s doing to him, then doubts it.

Mindless and deeply into the tale he’s spinning, Donghyuck’s fingers tighten around Mark, burrow into the shallow flesh about thin bone. Mark touches his hand, marvels at how Donghyuck loosens up without a hitch in his words, and smiles.

While Donghyuck is distracted, Mark quickly turns away and coughs into his hand, clenching his fingers before anyone else can see the flash of yellow and slipping them into his pocket. He has half a jarful of them, now.

Maybe he’ll keep them forever.

Mark is sixteen, and he knows.

**Author's Note:**

> [02.05.2020] the lovely _j_lopez on instagram has made some truly beautiful art for this fic over [here!](https://www.instagram.com/p/B_plPb2qGXl/?igshid=hy1s8kr7z8az) it even features sunflowers and moonflowers, which is what hyuck would produce when he falls for mark. please give it some love. ♡  
>   
> if you did enjoy this, do leave a kudos and tell me what you think!  
>   
> [twt](https://twitter.com/jaemjens/status/1217066831480901632) | [cc](http://curiouscat.me/baibao)


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